Waste Streams
Nuclear power has at least four waste streams that may harm the environment:
- they create spent nuclear fuel at the reactor site (including plutonium waste)
- they produce tailings at uranium mines and mills
- during operation they can release small amounts of radioactive isotopes
- during accidents they can release large quantities of dangerous radioactive materials
The nuclear fuel cycle involves some of the most dangerous elements and isotopes known to humankind, including more than 100 dangerous radionuclides and carcinogens such as strontium-90, iodine 131 and cesium -137, which are the same toxins found in the fall out of nuclear weapons".
Read more about this topic: Environmental Impact Of Nuclear Power
Famous quotes containing the words waste and/or streams:
“But that beginning was wiped out in fear
The day I swung suspended with the grapes,
And was come after like Eurydice
And brought down safely from the upper regions;
And the life I live now’s an extra life
I can waste as I please on whom I please.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“And though all streams flow from a single course to cleanse the blood from polluted hand, they hasten on their course in vain.”
—Aeschylus (525–456 B.C.)